Been a busy week for the two Polly's on this side of the ocean. And by busy, I mean a lot of time spent on planes, trains, automobiles (well, mostly boats actually) and a lot of eating various fried foods. NOM. We left St. Laurent at the nifty speed of approximately 40km/h. The people we had agreed to drive to Cayenne in our taxi ad been very french vis-a-vis the size of their luggage, so it turns out two small bags meant two largish suitcases. The peugeot 206 was not a happy bunny and it took us a while to get there...
Iles de Salut were again beautiful on Friday. Bouncy catermeran (however you spell it) journey, leading to general sogginess for most of the day, but whatevs. Spent the night at Olivia's preparing for Brazil by drinking rum and swimming in her pool- classic. Returned the car early on Saturday only to be greeted by a banterous man from the congo in a jeep ready to drive us to the border. Luckily he slowed down to a casual 140km/h when taking sharp corners, so we arrived alive- just about. Yet another cheeky canoe across the border (a new! border for me this time!) and we arrived in Brazil! Happy days, the holidays have begun.
We struggled with our bags (mine and olives being probs about 10kg, a certain other member of our party dragging up the rear with her 37,000kg .... ) and made it to the border stamping place. Haven't a clue want went on but we got a free glass of water out of it and the man stamped the front cover of my passport as there is no room inside. Jokes. We passed the afternoon sat by the river eating bbq and fruit juices for a fraction of the price of what it would cost back in french land just a 10 minute drive away.
Night- bus left at 6pm. Luckily our friend Lucy had gone to the office a few days earlier to reserve us tickets. Apparently such a motley crew of sweaty English people don't rock up too often, so the women handed us a note and said (blahhhhhblahhhablala) which I believe meant oh, this use be for u! and handed us a note from lucy which had been stuck to the bus station desk for 4 days!
Do not be fooled, portugese may be written a bit like spanish, but with the russian mafia accent that it comes with it is completely impossible to understand anything! its the first time I have been in a country without even the basics of the language for a long while and its very strange and frustrating. The whole place has pretty much been laughing at us.
The bus was bumpy but generally uneventful and we arrived to Macapa bus station at 5am. I here experience my first bus station shower, and came out, at 6, refreshed, clean and ready for a 24hr boat journey to the next place. We headed to nearby Santana the buy the boat tickets and discovered that once that was done (the time was now 7am and the boat left a 2pm), there was not a lot else to do in the town. We checked out every bakery in town and every sleazy man in the town (every man) checked out us. We were all ready to get on the boat when 2pm rolled round but the man from the tour office casually informed us it was running a couple of hours late.
It arrived- at last, and we got a good spot for the hammocks. Not to near the engine, or the toilets, or the bar. Right in the middle of the second deck . I was protected by pole which meant no one could hang theirs next to me but Polly A wasn't so lucky and soon her hammock area was swarming with dodgy looking creatures, most of whom spent the whole 24hrs drinking beer and eating toasties from the bar.
It was pretty cool the whole chilling in a hammock staring out at the amazon business lots of green, lots of river, much what you would expect really! Tomorrow we are embarking on a 4-day version of the same thing- will keep you posted as to how that goes!
We arrived in Belem last night, dropped off our stuff at the hostel and headed out for some food and a beer. Luckily there were some russian (sorry portugese accented ) banterouses on another table who invited us to sit with them. We declined, so they took to sending us drinks over the whole night. Later on we ended up sat with them and the free beers turned into free cocktails. All in all a bargain of a night- Luckily Polly J can hold her alcohol enough to find us a taxi back to the hostel- as the others apparently don't remember a thing. Good work team.
Had the day in Belem today- sneaky trip to the cinema this afternoon to see os, lots of cheeky fried food and ice-cream and NO more caiprinhas. Tomorrow we set off for a place called Santarem which is supposed to take about 4 days or something something. Wish us luck!!!
Still loving the blogs ladies! <3
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